Wedding Date Etiquette Dilema

My FI and I recently got engaged on (1/4/14), and had some difficulty selecting a date based off of when his siblings were home from college and when the church/ wedding reception venue were available. The church only does Saturday weddings, and my mom wanted a 3pm wedding ceremony. We finally settled on 6/13/15 for our wedding date.

This past weekend, my FI’s mother told me that her neice is getting married on the same day and year. No one has made a formal announcement since we are so far out.

In the past 2.5 years that my FI and I have been dating, I have never met this cousin of his and he is not close to her (she’s five years older). As most of my FI’s family is local, we were expecting the majority of his family to attend our wedding.

If they do have the same wedding date as mine, is it rude to ask the cousin to move her date? I am not sure who got engaged first, however my parents have already paid the security deposit for the reception site and no other dates were available in early summer. Additionally, the cousin is not getting married in a church which leads me to believe (maybe ignorantly) that it shouldn’t be hard for her to move her wedding date since they are getting married and the reception is in a hotel. My FI’s mother did tell me though, since the neice is not getting married in a church they will not be attending the wedding even if it is on a different date.

As exciting of a time as this is for myself and my FI’s cousin, I really don’t want to make his family choose between our two weddings. I feel like this is going to start both of our marriages off on the wrong foot by forcing family members to “pick sides.” My FI refuses to have a wedding in Annapolis in July/August/September, and we can’t have it in May because his younger siblings (who are in the wedding) will not be home from college just yet.

Has anyone been in a similar situation, or known someone who’s been in a situation like this? How was it handled and/or what is the proper etiquette for dealing with this situation? I don’t even care if they have a Friday wedding and ours remains on Saturday, or the get married the weekend before or after us. After all, they will be my family in the future, and I would like to attend their wedding and celebrate as well!

If they already have a deposit down (and they likely do), they can’t move the date. We are not having a church wedding either, and yes, it’s kind of ignorant to assume they can change because of that. Our ceremony and reception are in the same place, and we have paid a deposit. I’m not sure who booked first, but by not announcing when there’s another engaged family member, you both kind of left yourself open for this.

I don’t feel it is ever appropriate to ask someone to move their wedding date. If they also hear your wedding is the same date and don’t do anything then there’s nothing else you can do. FI has some family who also had another wedding the same day as ours but they’re all coming to our wedding. We don’t even know the other person getting married personally and didn’t find out until later that both weddings were the same day. I guess they were told verbally about the other wedding first but they’re closer to FI and I, so they decided to come to our wedding.

FI’s brother is also getting married three months after us and for some family that would need to travel across country for both weddings a few have decided to go to neither one. Others decided to just go to ours because it’s first and they already made plans before FBIL was even engaged, and some will probably go to FBIL’s because while out of state they’re still technically closer distance wise to him than us, it’s not ideal but we all make it work.

You point out the trouble you would have moving your date, yet assume it would be easy for her to move hers? Just because she’s not having a church wedding doesn’t mean her wedding is easier to move. She still needs a venue and reception hall, just like you.

If she’s set the date before you, then she got the date, and that’s all that matters. You’ll be able to find another date. Siblings can come home from college and miss a day or two. You can be flexible with the timing of your wedding and not do it at 3pm on another day. Your fiance can stop “refusing” to have a summer wedding (Summer in Annapolis is gorgeous, so I don’t understand why he won’t consider this).

I think it would be very rude of you to ask someone you don’t even know to change her date, especially since you don’t know about what she’s gone through trying to get that date.

It just seems to me like you are both being really inflexible with the date and are trying to justify a way to rudely tell someone to change their date because you’re unwilling to consider the alternatives. I know this isn’t what you were hoping to hear, but I believe it’s the truth.

@mdwilson86: No, you cant ask someone to move their wedding date to accommodate you. They would be offended and angry.

The only thing you could maybe do is ask your FMIL if she wants to mention something to the niece or her Mother to make sure they are aware of the conflict. She should not suggest they do anything like change their date, just let them know so they can make their own decision about what they want to do.

However, if your FMIL knows about the conflict, her niece probably does too and if so, there’s no point in saying anything.

This isn’t an etiquette issue. People are allowed to choose the wedding date they want and its completely irrelevant who got engaged first, how long the couples have been together or who is older. Yes, it would be crappy for a friend or relative to knowingly pick the same date if the guest lists are going to be similar but that doesn’t appear to be the case here.

What you and your in-laws should do is just be gracious and not be hurt or offended by those relatives that choose to attend the cousin’s wedding.

@mdwilson86: Since your FMIL knew offhand when the cousins date was and that it wasn’t in a church wouldn’t that kind of tell you that they had already locked in that date?

And it is pretty awful of you to think that it would be easier for her to move her date. All venues whether it be a church or an otehr type of wedding venue book out.

I think you can choose any date you want but I also think it would be pretty crappy to knowingly choose the same date as a close family member and by close I mean sharing a large part of the guest list. I also think it is a pretty crappy move to put family in the middle of this by having to choose whose wedding to go to.

Honestly if I found out that you did this and your reasons why I would probably attend her wedding even if I wasn’t going to before because well they would seem like the nicer people who I would want to support.

Thank you everyone for your feedback. As I previously mentioned, I am probably ignorant to a lot of this as we just got engaged and I have never done this before.

For those who have made rude comments however, please note that I honestly don’t care about the exact day of the wedding… It’s just another day of the year and holds no significant meaning for my FI or I. That being said, I believe that some of you missed the entire point of my concern.

1) I don’t want my FI’s family to have to choose between one wedding or the other. I would like for them to attend both weddings. I would like my FI’s cousin to be able to attend our wedding, and if invited, I would gladly attend hers. (Is the solution to this for us to both keep our wedding dates? See if they would want to do a shared reception? Have family attend a ceremony for one and a reception for another?)

2) My FMIL found out this weekend when talking with one of her sisters about the wedding date. She immediately called to tell me. This is not information that she was keeping from me.

3) FI’s family does not have money to fly siblings home at the end of their school year just to attend their brother’s wedding. (This is a non-negotiable. My FI’s family does not have a lot of money and I refuse to force them to pay twice to fly three of their children from CA to MD and back for the wedding and then a few weeks later for the end of school).

4) We had originally selected 6/27/15 with a 1pm wedding ceremony. A 3pm ceremony opened up at our church and my mother insisted that we take it. This was all prior to finding out about my FI’s cousin. Had we known this information in advance, I my parents would have refused to have selected the same wedding date. At this time, the 6/27/15 1pm time slot is booked at the church so we can’t go back. (My parents are paying for the wedding so I feel like my hands are a bit tied on this one. I don’t care about a 3pm wedding the way my mother does… does anyone have helpful advice on dealing with that?)

5) When I stated that we assumed that the majority of my FI’s family would be attending our wedding, we also assume that the other couple would expect the majority of their family would attend their wedding too. Again, I (ideally) would like to have his family attend both.

While I certainly appreciate the feedback, please keep in mind that I’m looking for advice on how to best remedy the situation, so if you don’t have anything nice or helpful to say, I’d prefer you to not post. Thanks!

Why not take this back to your FMIL? It’s her sister’s daughter getting married, she may have an idea or two, since she deals with her own family alot. I would also include FI in the discussions, it’s all nice for him to dictate the parameters of what month he will/will not get married in, he should see the kind of rucus the small window of time he wants to get married in, is causing. He may see things differently.

July may not be too bad in Annapolis, it’s August I would avoid like the plague. (I’m from Northern Baltimore Co.).

Dear first off I think pp are just sharing the opinions you asked for- no ones being rude. Thicken up your skin for the internet! It can be harsh but honestly the bee is the nicest. Now to your issue:

it sounds liKe you looked high and low for a date, working against many constraints, you finally found one a booked a deposit: done and done. What I would do with the cousin is as follows: have your FI call his cousin and explain:

“oh cousin you wouldn’t believe what ended up happeninfg. We are SO sorry but we just didn’t realize when we paid the deposit and we were up against a lot of scheduling challenged. Congrats and your engagement and we really wish we could be there! We will have to celebrate another time.”

dont ask her to change the date- maybe she will on her own, maybe she won’t care. About losing some family- yes that will happen but it’s not the end of the world. Just have FIs side of the family explaining what a random accident it was. And send your STDs out early!

ETA: you can also have FMIL have these convos with cousins mom (her sister?) on your behalf- just have FI make sure she doesn’t offer for you guys to change the date!

@j_jaye: My FI and I selected our wedding date separate from his cousin and her FI. No one intentionally choose the same date as anyone else… it just happened that way.

I also do not want family to have to choose sides (you seemed to completely miss that part in the initial post) as I feel it may lead to feelings getting hurt… not on my party but with my FI and his family.

@HisIrishPrincess: That’s a great idea and was the first thing that I recommended to my FMIL. I asked my her to call her sister to discuss details. As it is not my direct family I really don’t want to be involved (no do I think it’s my place). I really just don’t want this to end up putting a damper on things when this is supposed to be such a fun and exciting time for both families! 🙂

I just can’t believe the odds of two family members selecting the exact same date so far in advance completely unknowingly to one another! I almost have to laugh at the odds of that happening. 🙂